The Nexia doorbell sensor although made specifically for doorbells, is also designed for this purpose, but is only available on the US frequency.
Fibaro also makes a “universal sensor” for this purpose, but it is only available in the UK zwave frequency:
The Ecolink door sensor is only available on the US frequency, and is a popular choice.
And new for 2020: Zooz has a very interesting zwave S2 module for the US with 3 dry contacts:
Other kinds of input
On the other hand, if you mean to include devices that can handle an external probe, such as for temperature or moisture, there are several but they are very different from the ones with dry contacts.
The Fibaro. RGBW Controller can accept input from four different analog sensors, and is popular for greenhouse operations.
There are other devices which can accept input from a single probe sensor, most commonly temperature. But before I start listing those, I wasn’t sure if that was what you were interested in.
Thanks for the post! I had the same issue sourcing the Aerotec one.
AHH I never thought this through - one thing i needed was for the sensor to be simply binary. i.e. if I put my output from my traditional motion sensor into a temperature dry contact sensor, it wouldn’t give me a 1 or a 0 it’d give me nonsense.
Also, technically every Z wave device can “accept input from external sources,” that’s what the radio communications are. So I do think you need to make your topic title more specific.
ah OK ! Does sound a nice device. I also think in the example use case I can see why people have chosen to hack a binary sensor like a door sensor as (I’m assuming) they’re cheaper
thanks @xdreamwalker! does it open up to have dry contact input? or did you have to hack the hardware in some way?
I’m in the UK but surprisingly they aren’t too expensive to import from an Amazon.com marketplace seller! over 4 x more than I pay for Xiaomi door sensors, but that’s not the point, they can potentially save me buying the more expensive dry contact bridges like the Mimolite
There are screw terminals inside for the external contact. You will need to make a hole in the case for wires. There is a thread around here somewhere that has more details.
Wha I don’t know is if they make a UK frequency version.
For the UK, look at the Fibaro Sensor options. They are available on the UK zwave frequency but not on the US frequency. They are quite popular in the community.
Here’s an example using the door sensor:
And here’s their “universal sensor” which is designed for the purpose.
Hi @JDRoberts was wondering if you could help advise on something.
I got the Universal Sensor and i’m having a real struggle getting it’s output into SmartThings. It’s a fairly complex device for my needs, do you think i’d have a simpler task with the Fibaro Door Sensor? (it’s annoyingly £10 more but I’m willing to pay that for simplicity of configuration)
EDIT: I’ve just seen that the available Fibaro door sensor is now the v2, whereas all posts I can find on this forum are for the v1, do you have any idea if the v2 has dry contacts?
thanks Alwas! Saved me buying another expensive device!
Really struggling to find a basic contact sensor with dry contacts for use with my GuardLink driveway alarm in the UK - has anyone got any more suggestions for me please?